Art therapy uses the creative process of making art to improve your physical, mental, and emotional well-being. The creative process that comes into play in expressing yourself artistically, can help you to resolve long standing issues as well as manage your behaviour, feelings, stress points while improving self-esteem and awareness.

You don’t need to be a creative powerhouse or a trained artist to gain from the benefits, of art therapy. There are professionals who can work with you to explore the underlying messages communicated through your art, helping you to heal during the process. Art therapy achieves different things for different people. It is used for counselling by therapists, healing, treatment, rehabilitation, psychotherapy, and enables you to dig deep into your inner-self, thus providing you with a deeper understanding of the inner you.

Expressing the artist in you

Drawing and painting have been embedded in our DNA from the beginning of human history. Cave paintings, which date back 40,000 years ago, have been found in Asia and Europe. Their exact purpose is still unclear but it is generally felt that they weren’t done just for decorative purposes. Experts seem to think that they were meant as tools of communication.

Over the centuries, world famous artists and ordinary people, have used pencils and paints to convey their thoughts, dreams, ambitions, depression, outbursts of joy and exhilaration, praise of the Gods they worship, the deepest love, fear, hatred or any other passionate emotion, to the world around them.

Any form of art, as a therapeutic activity, is a well-known and established form of treatment today. And it’s specially beneficial for those who, quite often, need to express themselves via non-verbal communication. Most of us have done some amount of drawing, at some point in time. As babies and kids, we ran riot on any material – walls, floors, magazines and books – anything that came to hand. And we let our creativity run free. It’s that very process that can be a healing process – for you.

That’s what you can do. Because expressing yourself through art has a whole host of benefits, such as:

Expressing emotions in a socially acceptable manner

Making communication easier – overcoming barriers of language and emotions

Giving you the freedom to be yourself

Reducing negative feelings

Enhancing positive emotions

It has a positive effect on medical conditions. An improvement in your psychological, mental and emotional states has a beneficial effect on your physical health

Using pencils, brushes or crayons help to exercise and strengthen hands and fingers, improving hand-eye coordination and mobility

Art enhances brain activity and improves mental acuity

Meeting like-minded people, on a common artistic platform

Art, quite often, is a group activity. It’s an activity you can do in the company of others – friends, relatives and care givers. It promotes relationships and strengthens friendships. It involves having fun with friends and family, and can be a great source of entertainment. You are also using your mental capability to create something that is individual to you. You are expressing yourself.

In fact, creating a piece of art will make you, the creator, feel better about yourself. It will also bring about significant physical changes in your body. It doesn’t matter whether you can draw a straight line…Whether your pictures are perfectly proportionate…Your colours extraordinary… Just draw the vision that you have in your mind’s eye. Because it’s fun. It gives you pleasure. And it’s an expression of your individuality.